Learning Spanish involved getting to grips with the subjunctive. For instance, cuando vas and cuando vayas are two very different animals. Both might well be translated into English as when you go, but the indicative would imply habitual action, whereas the subjunctive would suggest potential consequence, the former followed in English by the present tense, the latter by the future, as in when you go, I'm happy or when you go, I'll be happy.
This understanding of the building blocks of another language then fed back into my view of English. Once I recognised that the it's a syntactic way of expressing what might happen or what might have happened, I also realised that the subjunctive mood is an integral part of any poem in any language, whether it's invoked explicitly or not. And thus my view of poetry also shifted. The counterpoint of bilingualism is always enlightening.
Sunday 27 October 2024
The subjunctive
Monday 21 October 2024
Poetry London submissions
It's interesting to note that Poetry London have closed to submissions for a period. According to the editor, Niall Campbell, there'll be more info when we decide how best to proceed.
Poetry London, of course, use Submittable, and have been inundated with poems over the last few months, in an experience that's shared by many major journals. The current dynamic feels unsustainable, that's for sure, if we don't want to burn out our editors and embitter our poets.
Tuesday 8 October 2024
The Madrid Review
The Madrid Review is a top-notch addition to the European literary scene, both online and in print (see their website via this link). I'm delighted to have three poems and a prose piece in their forthcoming issue, which is packed with big hitters. Here's a sneak preview of the cover...
Wednesday 25 September 2024
Where do we go from here?
Rather
than going for a provocative hot take, I’ve waited ten days since
returning from the U.K. before posting my reflections on the trip. A total of five
readings in six days was certainly an intense experience, and it gave me a real
feel for the poetry scene right now.
First
off, it served as a timely reminder that 99% of U.K. poetry exists beyond
social media and isn’t even aware of many trendy self-publicists. This is
especially true beyond the big cities and festivals, at readings above pubs or
in arts centres in provincial
towns, where people attend and buy books through a pure love of the genre.
These people, of course, are my readers.
Secondly, I was struck by just how many remarked on their disillusionment with
the direction that many major journals, festivals and publishers have taken in
recent years. In fact, there’s clearly a sizeable chunk of poetry readers,
purchasers and aficionados who feel disengaged with current fashions. And I’m
not just invoking embittered white male OAPs here. Event after event, I
encountered varied members of my audience coming up to me at the interval or
once the reading finished, champing at the bit to discuss the issue, expressing
deep frustration.
As
an individual poet, I can plough my own furrow, reaching out to readers via
initiatives such as my recent tour. But a wider issue remains. The disconnect
between the London-centric Poetry Establishment (in its changing guises) and
its customer base beyond a miniscule social media bubble has never been
greater, with the impression that the former has turned its back on the latter so long as the funding keeps rolling in.
That’s
a dangerous state of affairs for any genre that wishes to achieve anything
beyond mere narcissistic self-expression, self-flagellation and self-adulation. Where do we go from here?
Tuesday 27 August 2024
Whatever You Do, Just Don't...Miss It!
Whatever You Do, Just Don't...Miss It! My September tour, that is, five readings in the space of six days. It would be great to see you at one of them...!
Wednesday 7 August 2024
The Spotifying of poetry
In
recent conversations with a friend (Hi Mat!), the Spotifying of poetry came up.
By this term, I don’t mean that poetry is necessarily moving to Spotify, though its presence is certainly growing there.
Instead, I’m referring to changes that are taking place in how we consume both
music and poetry.
The
emergence of Spotify seems to have encouraged people to listen to hit after
hit, each from a different group or singer. And in a similar way, social media
appears to have enabled us to scroll straight from one individual poem to
another. Bearing in mind that most of us are listeners as well as readers, has
the shift in how we consume music also played an additional role in altering
how we approach poetry?
However,
there’s still a trenchant percentage of people who prefer albums, for the way
tracks bounce off each other, for the layered, more accumulative listening that
helps us appreciate artists more. And then we've got the álbum tracks, which we
often end up treasuring more than the hit singles themselves.
And
along similar lines, single-poet full collections still have a niche. I believe
there’s such a thing as a collection poem, for instance, rather than a magazine
poem. A collection poem might be slight if offered up on its own, but it complements
the bigger poems around it when placed in the context of an ms, establishing
dialogues and connections that run through a book and provide the whole with
greater depth.
In
fact, I have to admit that I’m starting to wince when I see poets and readers
stating on social media that a poem is a banger. Banger after banger can get
extremely tedious and mind-numbing after a while. As can hit after hit on Spotify…
Sunday 28 July 2024
A poem by Barry Smith
I'm delighted to feature a poem by Barry Smith today, taken from Reeling and Writhing (Vole Books, 2023), his most recent collection, which is something of a retrospective. In fact, it includes work written across half a century, encompassing a range of styles from sonnets and songs to mock heroic satire, spinning off ideas from the Sixties to the Twenties!
The poem's title is ‘Supplicant’. It's technically adroit, accumulating details, layering them deftly, gradually drawing us in. Much of its power lies in its use of reportage, never telling the reader what to think. Instead, it juxtaposes observations and invites us to engage with its religious and societal ramifications, lifting what might first appear a mere anecdote into resonant verse. I hope you enjoy it...!
Supplicant
As
if called to midday prayer he hunches
on
all fours, his back turned to the abbey
where
angels and pilgrims blithely
ascend
heavenwards gripping stone ladders
flanking
iron-studded oak doors
while
solemn attendants collect entrance fees.
The
crouching man kneels in convocation,
vision
fully engaged with grey pavement
as
a blackly bristling wire-haired terrier
stands
guarding his singularly suppliant master,
sole
immobility in this crush of busy shoppers
hustling
beneath civic Roman colonnade
rising
in fluted stonework above.
No-one
pauses or seems to witness,
no
hasty handful of change clinks by his side,
only
the pool of liquid spreads
slowly
suppurating the patch
between
recusant dog and man.
Barry
Smith
(first published in Liminal, a Chichester Stanza Anthology)